Was America a bystander, collaborator or perpetrator during Holocaust?

Question

i no that we were involved in WWII fighting against hitler but things like the evian conference, and various groups in the US seemed to not care about the jews.

Answer 1

Indirect collaborator. The US doesn't care about anyone but itself.

Answer 2

~The result of the Evian Conference should tell you all you need to know. If not, the Bermuda Conference 5 years later adds the exclamation point. The story of the S.S. St. Louis should give you a little insight as well.

But for the above, Hitler may not have fully understood just how far he could go with his policy for the Jews (not to mention the millions of others who would eventually find their way into the camps to be eradicated). With the world giving him its tacit approval, he proceeded.

Who was the US to interfere with the internal policy of a sovereign nation with whom, until December 1941, the US was at peace. Iraq and Afghanistan aside, pre-emptive war has been deemed illegal by international custom and treaty. Perhaps that is why Germany and the rest of the world did not intervene when the US, through the Bureau of Indian Affairs, engaged in its own program of genocide - although the Nazis did use that "national cleansing" as a guide in designing its own scheme a few decades later.

The Nazis were neither unique not original, and, unfortunately, latter day despots have followed in their footsteps. Witness the support for "blasting Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran and North Korea back to the Stone Age."

It was inconvenient for the US to do anything about Hitler, just as it was inconvenient for the US to do anything about Stalin, Mao, Idi Amin, Papa Doc, Suharto, Pol Pot, Diem - well, you get the point. Why single out the US? The rest of the world was just as willing and eager to look the other way.

Answer 3

A Bystander thought FDR had heard rumors about the mass destruction of populations in Europe by the German's he didn't credit them as it was felt that the reports were just war propaganda. Sec Morgenthal carried reports to the Oval Office many times but by the time Roosevelt was made to believe no one could figure out how the United States could stop the Holocaust.

This comes from extensive study of WWII and FDR.

Answer 4

Americans were very much aware of the Holocaust, provided they paid attention to the news. However, it would be inaccurate to say that the USA was either a "collaborator" or a "perpetrator" of the genocide.

Probably the most direct contribution America made to the Holocaust was the denial of immigrants from persecuted countries. There is no question that the government knew what would happen to European Jews who were denied entry visas (including the family of Anne Frank).

Answer 5

You should ask IBM this question. While America as a nation, on the whole, remained ignorant of the scale of the Holocaust some American corporations profited from it.

"WW2 Hollerith punched card machines needed special programs, devised by the monopolistic IBM, and special paper cards, which were supplied to the Nazis despite trade sanctions and embargoes throughout the war.

This technology of repression was used in every slave labour concentration camp and extermination camp, and ran the railways which transported the victims. The industrial scale killing machine effiency of the "Final Solution" could not have happened on the scale that it did without ID Cards and Centralised Data Processing.

It would be an insult to the memory of the Holocaust victims whose suffering on an industrial scale could not have been achieved without IBM's willing and profitable abuse of Hollerith card punching and sorting technology, if IBM or its successors were to be allowed to help to produce an ID Card scheme.

To be fair to IBM, the same Hollerith technology was used to help run the Allied war effort, including the classification, roundup, arrest and and forced detention of innocent Japanese American citizens."

See "IBM and the Holocaust" by Edwin Black

Answer 6

None of the above. Most Americans were horrified after we found out, but when much of it was occurring, we didn't even know. There was little we could do - it took the Allies nearly five years to successfully enter German territories (where these atrocities were occurring), and had we known, there would have been little to do.

It wasn't just the "Jews" that were decimated - Hitler hated Blacks, people with infirmities, and all sorts of other classes of human beings. His worst was against the Jewish people, however.

Answer 7

I would say they were a bystander. We will never know if America knew about the Holocaust before they entered the war, but they knew that Hitler was invading other countries and killing innocent people. We helped supply England and Russia with war supplies, but left it to Europe to defeat Hitler.

Answer 8

It is true that we could have done more for the people in the concentration camps but no body knew about them, not even the majority of the german population. I say majority because only about 10 percent of germans were nazis. So there was really nothing we could do about it.

Answer 9

A bystander for the most part. We could have done much more to save those people.

Answer 10

I guess winning the war and leaving German in a pile of rubble wasn't good enough???

Maybe you're asking why didn't we jump in sooner to stop the Nazi killing machine? 1944 was the earliest that the US and her allies could mount an attack that had any chance of success against the Atlantic Wall, but i guess you can re-write history and put the blame on our back...nice try....it won't work.

Answer 11

We were heroes. We went over there and freed them from concentration camps. If anything we were heroes, we did what was right, and fought for what was right. We fought so that people, could live to see a tommorow, without being beat up or shot, for being mentally ill, gay, different opinions, or being of another race. We stepped in, and and helped people.